I'm Back

What's up guys? I decided to take a little break from blogging because I was running really bad and was pretty upset. I didn't feel like I would put a good effort into writing a decent blog so I decided I would just not write at all. I regret making that decision for a number of reasons, but the main regret is that every time I was down this blog helped lift me back up. Whether it was just getting some things off my chest by writing or the inspiring comments I got from my readers, I always felt better after writing a blog entry. Anyway, we got some catching up to do.

Since we last spoke, I was dealing the Borgata Winter Poker Open. That was an awesome experience. I was dealing the grave shift, I made a lot of good connections and I had an amazing time. One night they even sent me downstairs to deal cash games. Dealers all over the city basically wish they could deal cash at Borgata and I was able to. That was pretty awesome. I dealt to Hevad Khan and Chris Moneymaker in one satellite. Hevad was a really cool guy, Chris was a total prick and a huge donk (not that you all didn't know already). I also deal to Jamie Gold's mom who was a sweetheart of a lady. Let's hope Borgata calls me to come and work there in the future.

Running Awful, Playing Worse

After the tourney it was a goal of mine to put in a ton of hands in Feb and make a lot of money. I did the first so far, but not the second. I was on the verge of making a move to 50NL when I went on a 12 Buy In downswing and was forced to move down to 10NL where I am now. It took a lot out of me and to be honest I don't really look forward to having to play 3k hands everyday just to make silver status on Stars. The standard for this month is I am a pay of wizard and when I get my money in as a big favorite I get sucked out on.

Showboat FINALLY!

So finally after months and months of waiting the Showboat finally called me and I just started working yesterday. I put in about 9 hours of 1/2 tourney and 1/2 cash dealing and I made $136 in cash tips, not bad I guess. I made a few silly mistakes as I was pretty nervous, but I will calm down as the days go on so I am not worried about it. I am pretty excited, but I doubt I will have anything exciting to report as the highest game we run consistently is a 1/2NL game.

Looking forward to blogging more, probably more poker related from now on but I am excited to be back for sure.

Borgata's Professionalism

So I started working the Borgata Winter Poker Open on the 15th, and I am super pleased with how things are going so far. I know my standards are low because most of the A.C. rooms (that I have dealt/played in) haven't been run all that well, but Borgata does things at such a high level. To start off they have an amazingly large and visually pleasing tournament room. The staff seems like a family and they welcome you into their family as soon as you walk in, it is very comforting. Also, the dealers are just 10x better skill wise than the dealers at the WSOP Circuit event at Harrah's. There are still a few sore spots, but for the most part all the dealers are more than competent.

Since there are so few things to complain about as a staff member and a player the atmosphere is much more relaxed and upbeat at this tournament. The players always seem to be in a good mood regardless of winning or losing. This makes my job so much more fun and the time just flies.

A Few Fun Hands

I work the 11pm to close shift. So as soon as I come in we deal a $80+$20 super sat to a $500 sat to the WPT Main Event. Most of the people busted out of the first 2 tournaments of the day, but are still in a good mood. The starting stacks and the structure is pretty good for a super in my opinion. You start with 10K in chips, blinds start at 25-50 and the levels are 15mins (probably the only sore spot of this tourney).

Everything was going smoothly and then this crazy hand came up. 5 people shoved all in pre-flop the hands were: 99,JJ,AK,AK,Q Q, and the flop comes 9JQ! How sick of a flop is that? Turn and river are two blanks and the AK takes down the whole pot. He ended up coming back and playing the super sat again today so I assume he didn't cash.

This hand was the very next hand. 4 people all in pre-flop: 99,AA, JJ,QQ. The flop came down 9 high and the person with the set of nines takes down the whole pot. I had side pots everywhere all day in this tourney but it was a super fun time.

Can I Stay Please?

Since the Showboat is not bringing me and the other person who got the "on-call" position there quite yet (word is they are waiting until they open their new room) I had to choose the 11pm-Sunrise shift to make sure that I didn't have any conflicts. Little did I know that I wouldn't work more than 4 hours in my first two nights because it gets so slow. If I could go back to the time I scheduled I would be taking the 6:30 shift. They seem to work the most. It's all good though, I am getting a ton of experience in a very well run room. I have learned more and picked up on more in these two days than I did in the whole WSOP Circuit. I guess I won't be making much money, but hopefully I can learn a lot and make a few connections.

Meet and Greet

I met my first person from the interwebs on the first night of the tournament. I was about 3am when I was signing out to leave and an Asian kid looks at me and goes, "Tworags?" I was like, "Yea..." and he says hey what's up I am Foxypham. He was a really cool kid, he lives in the area and stuff and it was really cool to meet him. I was a little uncertain about meeting people from the site because it just seems weird to me, but Foxypham was a real cool kid and I hope to see him again at some point during the tournament.

Alright, it is like 4am now and I am tired so I am going to get some sleep but I hope to post a daily if not every other day about some pro's that I have seen or some crazy hands that came up. Only other update I have is Hevad Kahn was at the first event railing one of his buddies who won a pot and either him or his buddy screamed, "BULLLLDOOOOZERRR" loud enough for the entire room to hear. It was pretty funny. Hope to see some of the other tworags.com guys and hope you guys do well in the tourneys, good luck at the tables.

Unfortunately, I have nothing to really update in this entry. I came back to A.C. after New Years and I just sit at home all day. I went to the Showboat to see if my paperwork is ready yet and it is still not. They are clearly having some issues with the department that takes care of these things. One of the guys I talked to said it could be because they locked that position up since I already got the job and they aren't hiring for it anymore. I don't know anymore. Basically, I am working the 11pm-Sunrise shift at the Borgata Winter Poker Open and whenever things get cleared up I should be working somewhere during the day--I assume at the Showboat. For now I just get to play a lot of hands of poker.

Check in with you guys soon.

Catch-Up!

First off, I want to apologize for not keeping you guys up to date during basically the most important time of my poker dealing career. During the tournament I was so tired I just went to sleep when I got home. During the Holidays I went home to my parent’s house and forgot my wireless adapter and I didn't have the internet for over a week I almost died lol. I finally can browse the interwebs so here it goes...

I left everyone off with me being 100% sure I was failing my Borgata drug test and I got the "on-call" dealing position at the Showboat. Things ended up turning out very differently than I had expected. About a day or two after I finished dealing the WSOP at Harrah's (I will get to that in a bit) I got a call from the Borgata asking when I wanted to go in for orientation and what hours I can work. Really?! Shhhhhweeeeetttt! Then I went in to get processed for the Showboat which essentially is filling out a bunch of bullshit paper work, taking a pick for your I.D. and a drug test, it takes like 10 minutes. I go in and the lady sits me down and tells me she doesn't have my paperwork so I can't get processed. WTF! I call the Showboat and after a few minutes we realize that I was just taken out of dealer's school and went to this audition I never applied for it. I applied online right away and that takes a few days (which goes into the holiday) and I expect a call from them to go in and get processed within a day or so.

WSOP Circuit at Harrah's

All I knew going into this job was to be there at 11:30 and where I was suppose to go, that is it. When I got there it was madness. The first event was a $300+40 with over 900 players including alternates. There were people everywhere, dealers didn't know what to do and we didn't get pushed for over an hour (normally dealers should move tables every 30 minutes). That was essentially the theme of the day: madness.

I didn't make any mistakes besides flipping over a few cards during the pitch, but I saw and heard the floor being called all over the place. It seemed often times it was because dealers were burning and turning before the action was complete. This is probably one of the bigger mistakes that a dealer can make because you change the cards up a bit. This could really piss the players off.

Oops!

A few days in everything was going really smoothly and I was loving my job then I did the worst thing a dealer can do. A player moved in UTG. His cards were in front of his chips and he pushed his chips in which pushed his cards in really far. Everyone folded super fast so I had like 8 cards to scoop up behind him and I accidentally mucked his cards as well. He goes, "Where the fuck are my cards?" I didn’t even realize I grabbed his cards. Essentially, since nobody called his bet yet all he had to do was call the BB and his hand is dead...he got the rest back. I know he has to protect his hand, but I have to pay attention.

Good Tables vs. Bad Tables

I know I don't have much experience dealing yet but I have a good idea of how this job is going to be. There are some tables that all the people are fun and you can converse and just have a good time and your 30 minutes fly by and I can't think of a better thing I could be doing. Then there are the bad tables. Nobody talks, they criticize everything I did and made me feel like a piece of crap. This is when I can't think of any job that is worse that I could be doing. That comes with working with the public though, oh well. I just don't know the exact procedures I need to do for every situation and people didn't like it, fuck them..lol!

The best table I had was with these two kids who clearly played a lot on Stars. One of you guys finished 3rd in the 2nd 1k event so holla at me if you read this. They were just joking around and they were cool with me talking at the table and stuff it was a good time. I had a number of tables like this, but a lot of the fun people were much older than me I felt like I related to these kids a bit more.

All in all this was an awesome experience and hopefully a lucrative one. I go for my first paycheck today. First thing I am buying is a TV that is actually bigger than my computer monitor lol!

Holidays

I hope everyone had a great holiday. I have to say this was probably the best Christmas I have had in years. Minus the fact that my Grandmother passed away and was not there my entire family was. It was the first time we all got together in a long time and it was just fun. The coolest thing I got for Christmas was an Xbox 360, but just a few days before my little brothers 360 fried out and I left it at home so he can use it until Microsoft replaces his. Basically he is one of the best Guitar Hero players in the world so he has to keep up with his scores and stuff and he just sent out his PS2 to get modded so he can play custom Guitar Hero songs on that (if you guys understand all that).

Professionalism

In my last blog I talked about how much better the Borgata is than all the other casinos in Atlantic City. This will be more of the same. We are about 3 weeks outside the Winter Poker Open and they had all the dealers come for orientation. I learned everything I need to know today...not when I got to the tourney, not three days in, I learned everything in advance. This tournament will be better run than the WSOP at Harrah's I guarantee! There will still be brand new "break in" dealers but the tournaments will be ran better overall. So be patient with new dealers and help them out be making them feel comfortable because most of the mistakes they will be making is because of nerves.

New Year's Resolutions

Here are mine:

Shorter showers
Less procrastination (thus finding more time to play poker)
Make lots of monies
Get benefits at work

As for poker:

Be playing 200NL by this time next year
Be playing somewhere around 6-8 tables as a norm
Supplement my income playing poker
Continue sticking with good BR management


And just as a joke because these pics are my ID pics from Harrahs and the Borgata I will post them. They are so bad I look like I was on “To Catch a Predator” and EdmondDantes insisted I post them for the LOL factor. I will probably post a normal picture of myself in the future or just make it my avatar I don’t know.





I guess you could tell who I am by those pics, so if you are playing the Borgata events holla at me. Happy Holidays and have a great New Year!

Recap

I left you guys off in the last blog with a lot of uncertainty. This blog will probably be no different. I don’t know where I stand with the Showboat and I am working the WSOP Circuit at Harrah's come December 8th. All I know about that is that I have to show up at 11:30…that’s it. I ended up getting a call from The Borgata about dealing their WPT Winter Poker Open and I had an audition in a few days.

Above the Rest

As most people know that live and play poker in the area, Borgata is a top tier casino. They have easily the best poker room in A.C. possibly the east coast (I have never been to Foxwoods, but I heard it trumps Borgata). Since their operation is at a much higher level they also demand more from their applicants. Unlike my WSOP Circuit audition I was required to answer questions. Some of them were the basic, “Why do you want to work here?” While others were, “What is the most important part of game integrity?” If you don’t know the answer to the second question I am glad you are not dealers! It is the rack. You must protect the rack at all costs when dealing a poker game. Not only this, but they demanded much more skill wise as well.

About a week later I receive a call from the Borgata congratulating me on getting the job. I was asked to go in to their offices and fill out some paperwork. Some is an understatement! I must have filled out like thirty pages of the same information over and over again. Name social address…name social address. After this I was brought into a cubicle, my info was checked out and I was told I had to take a drug test within 24 hours.

Puff Puff Pass

Basically, the last time I smoked weed was when I was in college (about 6-8 months ago), I can’t even recall when the last time was it was so long ago. I was not worried about failing the test. I have never smoked regularly just here and there when I was too drunk to say no. I have a shaved head and I always have so the person taking care of me asks me if I have any armpit hair. I say yea and she takes the hair needed from my pits. No biggie right?

When I get home I get curious as to how drug testing with hair works, so I decide to google it. To my surprise, when I get to the section that talks about people that have little to no head hair, they explain hair can be taken from the body, but it grows much slower therefore the time span is much wider for detection. It detects drugs for around a year! FUCK! Did some tiny mistake I made a long time ago just affect the most important opportunity of my life to date? I will know it approximately two days.

The Sweat

So I am sweating this drug test tremendously bad. I don’t get a call two days later, I don’t even get one five days later. If this goes one more day I am going to explode! This whole time I don’t know how I am going to explain this to my parents and I don’t even know how they are going to take it (I assume not too harshly, after all they grew up in the 70’s and my father was in a band). I talk to some people and they said, “You have to be a man and own up to your mistakes, just deal with it and move on.” Others informed me that they don’t even test everyone because it is so expensive (the test usually just acts as a deterrent itself because people who do drugs simply won't show).

Faith

Since my Grandmother passed a few months ago, I am slowly finding my faith again. I understand that throughout my life God is going to test me. I am going to be graded on how I react to these tests. Am I going to curse God for my misfortunes or am I going to accept the cards that life has dealt me and thank God for what I have? I chose the later. I don’t think I would have gotten through this situation without my faith.

Miracles Do Happen

At this point, I have accepted what is coming to me and I am planning out a way to tell my parents. My friend calls me and tells me he is coming down to visit and he is staying at the Showboat. I come along and we plan on getting drunk and just enjoying the night. I take my first shot of Goose when my phone rings. It is the lady from the Showboat who auditioned me. She asks me if I can stop in the room in the next few days so they can ask me a few questions. I tell them that I am in the hotel, I will be right down. I stop in and they tell me they are offering me a part time position dealing cash in their room. I guess my assumptions on the whole “alternate list” thing were wrong. I obviously accept and they tell me they will call me in a few days about what out best course of action will be (since I am dealing the WSOP).

As I leave the room my friend says, “Now you can tell your parents you just don’t want the Borgata job because you have a cash dealing job now.” Yes! I proceed to tell them this and I am in the clear. Now I just have to pass the Showboat drug test (I am basically completely hair free but my head lol). I should know in the coming weeks how the Showboat will pan out, but I will be anxious until then. In my next blog entry and will recap my first week dealing the WSOP events at Harrah's and possibly some Showboat news, GL all!